I've been doing political blogging since 2000, and running billstclair.com since sometime shortly after that. The time has come to hang up that pair of spurs. I'm doing this mostly because the constant barrage of bad news has destroyed my mental and emotional equilibrium, and I need to back off on the pressure if I am to survive. But it's also time to switch back to a spiritual focus, something I've largely lost sight of in the past few years, as my anger morphed into hate. Time for a big dose of love. Maybe I'll be able to handle the ugliness of the wider world at a later date, but for now I'm reducing temptations to give myself space to heal.

My plans:

I plan to make archives of the site, so that you can download a copy, if you want to save it. I'll change this paragraph in the plain-HTML version to contain links, once I've done that.

"End the War on Freedom" (billstclair.com/blog) will go dark, though I think I'll keep the images around in case people are using them. Non-image pages will forward to the plain-text version of this page. I may bring back the blog at some point, with a new name, and containing only my own personal content, not news links. But not for a while, if ever.

The index of billstclair.com will continue to contain the "Mirrors", "Stories", "Computing" and "Pictures" sections, with "Mirrors" at the end. I'll remove most of the intial links, and the entire "Politics" and "Guns" sections. I'll probably leave the content, to avoid breaking other people's links. But I may remove it at any time, so grab an archive if you care.

I will shutter freedomoutlaws.com, lyricsalone.com, nomorecages.org, obamabodycount.org, and patrickhenryproject.org, and allow those domains to expire. I'll give some notice for obamabodycount.org, by changing the images people are embedding to a warning notice, and soliciting interest in taking it over. I'll also solicit interest in taking over freedomoutlaws.com, for a short while before shutting it down.

brighter-world.org, jsmaze.com, lisplog.com, & truledger.com will continue to work. I'll likely eventually resume development of jsmaze.com, which has been languishing of late, due to my lack of energy. And I'll continue slow development of truledger.com.

I'll cancel my membership in the political forums I belong to, hanging around at thementalmilitia.com until I find somebody to take over my administrative duties there.

No more Twitter. No more Google+. I'll keep a minimal presence at Facebook, but defriend everybody who I don't know personally, in meatspace.

Dear Bill,
I feel your emotional upset. The entire world is upset, it seems, with cultures breaking along lines of contradictions and misunderstandings.

I, too, am making changes to get back on track with a more spiritual path, and will be scaling back, lowering my profile, and if I am writing, I will be focusing more on kinder, gentler, more loving writing when I go back to writing.

Life has become too precious to be involved in so much anger and contentious discourse. May we all find happier, more loving ways of living.

I wasn't, and haven't been, nearly as active as you, and I certainly felt some burnout. I have always admired the people, such as yourself, who keep at it over the years, and I've always appreciated what you have to say here, and at TMM, though I haven't been around there for a while now (ought to fix that). The continued onslaught of the JBTs is hard to watch. It's even harder to watch how so many people think that this is a good thing.

Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission.

-- L. Neil Smith

Reread that pesky first clause of the Second Amendment. It doesn't say what any of us thought it said. What it says is that infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? And if it's treason, then it's punishable by death.
I suggest due process, speedy trials, and public hangings.

Any official, appointed or elected, at any level of government, who attempts, through legislative act or other means, to nullify, evade, or avoid the provisions of the first ten amendments to this Constitution, or of the Thirteenth Amendment, shall be summarily removed from office, and, upon conviction, deprived of all pay and benefits including pension, and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

-- L. Neil Smith

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.

-- John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report on gun control laws.

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

Make no mistake: all politicians -- even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership -- hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician -- or political philosophy -- can be put.

If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.

If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.

What his attitude -- toward your ownership and use of weapons -- conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?

... like going to the bathroom, breathing, eating, sleeping, or making love, it turns out that self-defense is a bodily function one cannot safely or effectively delegate to a second party.

-- L. Neil Smith

This does not mean that "Marijuana should be available by prescription." It means that morphine sulfate should be available in five pound bags at the supermarket for a couple of bucks, like sugar... but probably in a different aisle, to avoid confusion.

-- Vin Suprynowicz

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

-- Edward Abbey

The state can only survive as long as a majority is programmed to believe that theft isn't wrong if it's called taxation or asset forfeiture or eminent domain, that assault and kidnapping isn't wrong if it's called arrest, that mass murder isn't wrong if it's called war.